Friday, September 17, 2010

F.U.V.M. Your Holiness, Ctd

The pope did not go far enough. Radical atheists like the British Humanist Association should apologize for Hitler. But they should not stop there. They also need to issue an apology for the 67 million innocent men, women and children murdered under Stalin, and the 77 million innocent Chinese killed by Mao. Hitler, Stalin and Mao were all driven by a radical atheism, a militant and fundamentally dogmatic brand of secular extremism. It was this anti-religious impulse that allowed them to become mass murderers. By contrast, a grand total of 1,394 were killed during the 250 years of the Inquisition, most all of whom were murdered by secular authorities.

Why should atheists today apologize for the crimes of others? At one level, it makes no sense: apologies should only be given by the guilty. But on the other hand, since the fanatically anti-Catholic secularists in Britain, and elsewhere, demand that the pope—who is entirely innocent of any misconduct—apologize for the sins of others, let the atheists take some of their own medicine and start apologizing for all the crimes committed in their name. It might prove alembic.

Notice how snakishly he inserts that the Pope "is entirely innocent of any misconduct."

Sure, that is a true statement if one doesn't consider abetting the rape of children by way of a structural and systematized cover up "misconduct." But, while we may already safely assume that the church sees it that way, the right-thinking world doesn't.

Furthermore, it either "makes no sense" for atheists to apologize for the crimes of others, or it does (it doesn't). That doesn't change as Donahue invents another "level" at which he may forsake logic.

So, as Donahue evidently thinks that it is wrong for atheists (or others, Catholics included) to demand apology and consequence for Ratzinger's actions, what he is saying is that two wrongs make it right - or, if two wrongs don't make it right, do two wrongs anyway. How Christian?